Cohort 3 Leadership Extension

Jacqueline Richard and Christie Landry of the team from Fletcher Technical Community College participated in the extension of Cohort 3 that focused in helping Change Agents improve their leadership skills.

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Leadership Accomplishments and Lessons Learned

Christie Landry

• Ability to propose ideas and develop a support system and leadership team to take a vision to productive outcomes
• Empowering others to take over projects to leverage the talents of a team
• Moving out of my comfort zone to tackle larger projects
• Named Interim Director of Region 3 in Louisiana's Regional STEM Network (La-STEM)

Jacqueline Richard

• Tapped as Interim Dean of STEM
• Enhanced understanding of leadership development that points to building teams and empowering teammates to achieve goals
• Used leadership strategies from the project to identify key skills and strengths of division faculty to develop these staff to become better faculty leaders

Activity Report

Activity Plan

We developed a faculty development group Teaching TooLS--The long term goal for our project is to develop a semester long workshop series surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion. To achieve this long-term goal, we initially focused on teaching and learning strategies to improve student outcomes in introductory courses (Spring 2021); we hosted a book club, using Teach Students How To Learn, by Saundra McGuire.

• The goal of the book club was to foster collaborative development of teaching and learning methods for incorporation into the classroom.
• The book club met 4 times to discuss content and ideas presented in the text. Prior to each meeting, participants will respond to a series of guided reading questions to promote discussion during facilitated meetings.
• Discussions were centered around metacognition, Bloom's Taxonomy, and study strategies with guidance on how teachers can incorporate these methods into their classrooms without restructuring their courses.
• The book club served as a resource for discussions geared toward enhancing student satisfaction and improving performance in their courses.
• During the discussions, a running list of ideas, questions, and scenarios will be recorded via MS-Teams for future reference. The meetings incorporated active learning strategies to reinforce concepts introduced in our Fall 2020 workshop.
• The book club drew faculty from STEM, Business, and the Tutoring Center.

We began investigating and developing pathways for students to earn Industry Based Certifications (IBCs) in our courses for the AS-Geology and AS-Environmental Science programs.

• Our goal is to increase diversity in our programs while generating a skilled labor force to meet the needs of our community. By producing a more diverse workforce, we hope that our program diversity will increase, which will help in recruiting, retaining, and expanding our current programs.
• Our secondary goal is to develop and implement IBCs to give students the needed experience employers are looking for, and will help students with gainful employment.
• A large virtual meeting composed of four advisory boards and faculty members was called.
  • The four advisory boards are: the AS-Geo board, AS-Envsci board, marine technology board, and the coastal sciences board.
  • Dean of STEM
  • Full-time faculty members who either run the aforementioned programs or advise students in those programs
• Pre-meeting, the paperwork and process to develop IBCs for official state approval was obtained, and the methodology was presented at the advisory board meeting to all the board members for consideration.
• Pathways for moving forward with implementing IBCs already approved by the state were identified, and received suggestions for developing new IBCs in a post-meeting google survey..
• An introductory discussion between Nicholls State University, our local 4YC, and Fletcher concerning transfer pathways into Environmental and Coastal Sciences was begun.

Results

TooLS: 

• Using feedback from participants, we are developing a faculty master course for accessing discussions, resources, teaching tools, etc. for use in their courses.
• We have recruited another faculty member to assist with organizing our faculty master course, to lead future book clubs, and to moderate discussion boards.
• Unexpectedly, we noted many non-STEM participants, particularly our Business program, attend both our book club and active-learning workshops.  We propose a continuation of this relationship to foster development of interdisciplinary courses to benefit both programs of study.
• Faculty members employing the teaching and learning strategies mentioned in the book club have noted anecdotal successes in their courses.  We intend to continue gathering data from implementation of these teaching and learning strategies for publication purposes.
• Results from implementation of teaching strategies will be presented at faculty convocation at the start of the Fall 2021 semester.

IBC:

• Results of a post-meeting google survey allowed us to break the advisory board out into working groups based on interest and focus.
  • Moving forward, the separate working groups can meet as needed for curriculum and IBC development.
• An unintended, but needed, working group was also identified during the meeting. The AS-Environmental Science program has a field and research methods course required by all majors. Our college, state, federal, and industry partners can give us the needed direction for the material taught in this course, whether it is IBC incorporated or uncertifiable skill focused.
• Results from one question on our post-meeting google survey allowed us to add new partners to our advisory boards and working groups.
• Certifications already approved at the stated level identified for implementation through google survey at the end of the advisory meeting:
  • ESRI certification
  • hydrographic certification
• Areas identified for IBC development:
  • Vibracoring
  • Water-quality testing
  • Airboats/conventional boat certification
  • Native/invasive Ecology
  • Depth Pole
  • GPS/Survey Equipment
• Discussions began with Nicholls State University, our local 4YC, to bring students out to the Farm to expose the students to Native Plant Initiative experts and introduce 2YC students to ongoing research projects available for their participation.

Lessons Learned

• Time management is vital to the success of any professional development program.
• Virtual meetings seemed to be more accessible to faculty; access to recorded discussions were useful for those unable to attend live meetings.
• Setting up post-meeting google surveys ahead of time is vital for quick and on time deployment to receive feedback when information is still fresh for participants.
• Continue with the organizational/advertisement pages for what to expect from the workshops (SAGE-pages from first workshop).
• Campus-wide participation in the book clubs/faculty development programs provided a unique opportunity for collaboration across disciplines, resulting in ideas for interdisciplinary courses and activities that would benefit students in non-traditional career paths.